


Outlast: Rated E for Everyone

by goods



Category: Outlast (Video Games)
Genre: AU: everything is wonderful and no one is exploited or harmed for profit, Gen, but I'm a lazy idiot, except for the swearing, pure and uncut crack, this was supposed to go out Halloween, unintentional badfic?, whateva whateva i do what i want
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-02
Updated: 2014-11-02
Packaged: 2018-02-23 15:24:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 4,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2552390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goods/pseuds/goods
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“A human mind in that environment is capable of extraordinary things.”</p>
<p>“You’re saying the experiment needed…?”</p>
<p>“A proximity…to FUN!”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Theremin

**Author's Note:**

> Send hate, death threats, or any expressions of general dislike in the comments below or my Tumblr: bunchawhats.tumblr.com

I.  
Miles’s first tip-off was the radio. Static overcame the announcer droning about agriculture, and the static was gradually overcome by the sounds of a Theremin. Appropriate, considering that tonight was Halloween. Unfortunate, because Miles really liked listening to boring AM radio like the boring, maybe middle-class white nerd with weird pink fingernails he was. 

Also unfortunate was that the Theremin sound went on for the next turn, past the Mount Massive Asylum sign, and realizing there was no end in sight, Miles turned off the radio. The lack of security was Miles’s second tip-off. Both of the gates were open and covered in orange and black streamers. Nothing and nobody was in the security booth except for a bunch of drawings that were either done by grade-school children, or adults that tried to draw with their non-dominant hands. ‘Halloween party inside,’ proclaimed the flimsy cardboard sign written in thick black Sharpie. The final tip-off was the near pile-up of cars in the front courtyard. Clearly, the families in attendance were left to figure out the parking situation, bereft of a helpful volunteer or personnel in a neon yellow vest. Miles went ahead and parked next to a Prius and made sure to leave a small dent with his driver’s side door, and for extra measure, scratched up the hood with his keys. 

The final, final tip-off was the ghostly mix of whispers, giggles, and whistling mountain air twisting through the various cars, trucks, and mini-buses. There were also the tell-tale crunches of dead grass and gravel. It set Miles a little on edge, so in a strange sort of retaliation, he started singing ‘Over at the Frankenstein Place’ in his best Susan Sarandon impression, which never failed to end an argument or to shut up anyone getting on his nerves. Even the mountain air quieted down after he sang the first line. 

‘This is probably going to be a fun night,’ Miles concluded pushing open the unsurprisingly unlocked front door.


	2. Onomatopoeia

II.   
Except for the streamers, balloons, trails of silly-string, crumbs, candy wrappers, and a buffet table lined up with some dope-ass cupcakes, there was nothing but silence. Miles had never wanted to hear the obnoxiousness that is several children in store-bought or hand-made costumes high on sugar and processed fats more. Otherwise, this was surely all a ruse to lure in freelance reporters and harvest their organs and/or sell them into white slavery—not necessarily in that order. Miles fought the temptation to call out a confused, “Hello?” because he did not want to fall for any horror movie clichés, no sir, no ma’am. As if going to a Halloween party—albeit a children’s Halloween party—at a former mental asylum wasn’t enough. 

Another flimsy cardboard sign that Miles managed to overlook while double fisting some more cupcakes pointed to the elevator and stairs behind the empty receptionist’s desk. ‘Halloween party inside—upstairs 2nd floor.’ Well that explained everything, kinda. Not really. Actually, no. 

Miles was more of an elevator man, so he pressed the down button and waited for the platform. He wondered why the entire elevator shaft smelled like blueberry Jell-O. Vast quantities of blueberry Jell-O. So much blueberry Jell-O, it would make anyone wonder if Jell-O was a sponsor. Hell, there was so much of it, it made anyone want to stock up on Jell-O, because goddamn that’s a good smell. Jell-O. 

Jell-O.

Okay, so Miles wasn’t actually enamored of the smell, but it did make him wonder where it was all coming from. And why the elevator platform wasn’t coming down. 

A long, building scream answered Miles before he could take the stairs. He looked into the empty shaft and saw what looked like a large package of tulle fall down past him before he realized it was a living body. 

There was no accompanying crash. Instead, there was a sound like a cross between a ‘GORP’ and a ‘FLURB’ but that’s more of a subjective thing, so if you think those words are ridiculous, choose another set of onomatopoeias and stop making that face, Nancy, you’re starting to piss me off. Not many people, other than the ones in attendance at Mount Massive, know what mass quantities of Jell-O acting as a working trampoline sound like, and Miles had just found out. 

The still living body was that of a young girl dressed as a ballerina, and her scream that had once sounded like it was out of fear was now of joy. Once she was out of sight, several more kids jumped in; on their way up, one of them had enough breath in their lungs to scream, “The elevator’s out! Wheeee!”

“Oh. Okay, sure,” Miles said in return.


	3. Shart

III.

There was no one upstairs on the second floor either. Odd. However, there were conveniently placed arrows made out of totally fake blood, like not real blood whatsoever, right? And they all lead Miles to the second-floor library door, where he couldn’t hear anything on the other side. He briefly thought about continuing to go up the stairs, or even falling down the open elevator shaft to use Jell-O transport, but he decided to trust in the arrows. Arrows are always right.

What the arrows failed to heed was the upside-down body that smacked against the open door and nearly caused Miles to shart his pants. When he realized the body was a hollowed-out plastic cadaver covered in gauze, he closed his eyes in disgust. Cheap Haunted House tricks always managed to work on him. He thought the joyous laughter and screaming coming from the elevator sounded a teensy bit crueler. 

Miles almost went ahead and entered the library, but then he realized he forgot his fricka-fracken camera, gosh darnit it all to heck, you cocksuckin’ motherfucker! How was he ever going to document his assignment and get underpaid for all his hard work? Why, he had a mind to pick up that there Halloween decoration and beat himself about the head and shoulders with it and—

“No way,” Miles whispered. His stomach simultaneously dropped and fluttered back into place. A tiny red light blinked at him in the dark. Unless it was some one-eyed goblin about to jump onto his face and devour his flesh, it was a camera. And it was a nice camera. Like out of the package, no smears on the viewfinder nice. 

By instinct, Miles knew it was his, and that he couldn’t be pinned as a thief. Nobody was distracted or stupid enough to leave it here—it was made just for him. And since it was made for him, of course there was going to be a night vision option. 

Everything was alright now. It was time to find the party.


	4. Chris

IV.

If the fake cadaver was tacky but effective, everything else in the library was genuine and definitely effective. Severed heads and extremities littered the ground and the bookshelves, the latex and plastic giving most the extremities away, but the heads with eyes gave them an eerie realism. Miles felt that for a haunted attraction geared towards kids, this seemed a bit much. Where was the day-glo paint and black lights? The strobe lights? The scary noises?

Well, there was one noise. It had started out as a ragged breath, the kind of breath let out by a deep sleeper, or a total creep that doesn’t have any consideration for your breathing room or an inhaler. It escalated into a snore once Miles found the source of it: a still very much alive body dressed in riot gear impaled through its chest, an offering of body parts at its feet. 

Once again, Miles screamed. He woke up the body.

“HUH? Wha—uh. What happened? OH WAIT!” said the body, realizing he had a part to play. “Th-they killed us. They got out. The variants…”

The library exit shook. Miles looked between the body and the door, at a loss. But he was going to be alright, maybe. The door rattled. Yeah, sure, he was going to be fine. The door FLEW OFF ITS HINGES. 

Miles was doomed.


	5. Rawr

V.

“RAAAAAAWWWRRRrrrrrrrr!!”

A roly-poly something or other with no shirt on and a mask ran into the library and latched onto Miles’s knees. Miles tried to maintain his balance while the little monster threatened several times to eat his face. 

“Okay, Chris.”

“I’m a Lizard Man! Rawr!”

“Chris.”

“I’mma eat your face! And then poop it out!”

“Chris! Uncle Stephenson is talking now!”

The little monster, now known as Chris, let go of Miles. A small and humble “s’rry” followed by a loud and mucous-y sniffle could be heard from underneath his large lizard mask the size of an astronaut helmet. 

“Now, it’s about time I get down from here. I think we’ve scared enough people for tonight.”

“Can I still be a Lizard Man?”

“You know you can, little man.”

Miles looked over the recent and scarce footage he had just taken with his camera. There seemed to be a missing frame between the final pound on the door and Chris rushing to maul his knees, but that couldn’t have been right. Upon closer inspection, Miles found a kind of smog curling like scorpion tail above Chris’s lizard helmet in the light of the doorway. Before even a chill could run down his back, he heard a voice say:  
“Welcome to the party, I’m Stephenson Stephen Stephens Stephanie Stephanopolos Stephenson. Most folks just call me Stephenson. The little guy that mauled your legs is my nephew, Chris. He dreamed up the whole haunted house thing.”

Miles looked up to see Stephenson with his hand out, and gave him his own to shake. 

“Miles Upshur, freelance reporter.”

“Oh sweet, you’re here to cover the party?”

Miles looked down and away, knowing that he was probably going to cover more than just a family-friendly Halloween party by the end of the night. The door was now in splinters. 

“Yeah, I’m here to cover the party. Say, do you want to explain that door trick to me?”

Miles could see through the camera that Stephenson was giving him a blank, but friendly look. The kind where the smile doesn’t quite match up with what the eyes try to say. Chris answered for him.

“It was Billy!”

The camera was now turned on Chris. The night vision on the camera picked up two bright full moons underneath the maw of the lizard mask, in addition to a shiny trail of snot. Dear Lord, this kid needed a tissue.

“Billy is my friend who has a frie…”

“Hey, little dude, I don’t know if we’re the right people to talk about that,” Stephenson spoke over him. “This is Chris, by the way. He’s my nephew.”

“Nice mask,” Miles said.

“Thanks! I’m 4, and when I gwow up, I wanna be a tuatara lizard.”

Miles chuckled at that. He had once wanted to grow up to be a fire engine. But he failed Anthropomorphism, so he switched his major to Communications and Journalism.


	6. Beer

VI. 

“You want a beer?”

“I was going to get one at the party.”

“No need! There’s beer here already, look,” Stephenson instructed. He dug his hand into one of the more realistic looking heads, and Miles cringed a little, thinking it sounded like someone was punching a fleshy bucket of Mac-n-Cheese. 

“Just give me a moment…” Stephenson said. He closed his eyes in concentration, somehow managing to get his entire arm inside the head. After a familiar clinking of glass and Stephenson’s subsequent noise of triumph, two bottles of beer were pulled out of the head. There was no gore, viscera, or blood to speak of on Stephenson or the bottles. 

“Here ya go!”

“Thanks…” Miles said with bewilderment. Luckily his want for beer was matched up with a strong stomach. Chris had taken down his own head and was pulling out gummi worms and shoving them in his mouth by the fistful. He had taken off his helmet to reveal a round head to match his round body. 

Stephenson twisted off his cap and took a good swig of his beer before saying, “Bout time we get to that party, huh.”


	7. Junk

VII.

Miles was glad enough to have a camera to call his own, but then he remembered the importance of keeping a notepad handy. Luckily there was a small pile sitting outside the library with a variety to choose from—the light purple one with ‘Girl Power’ in the upper left hand corner was the best choice. 

After questioning Stephenson some, Miles found out why Chris’s family enrolled him (not committed—sure, the whole Murkoff’s Totally Legit Sleep Studies for Kids Program was in a former asylum, but as far as Miles knew, nobody committed their children) – Little Chris Walker’s family was humongous. Sisters and brothers and aunts and uncles and grandparents and great grandparents and great great grandparents and second and third cousins twice removed and glued back together shared a single house, and strangely enough, most all of them were known to be sound sleepers. Everyone that is, except for Chris. 

“We tried all kinds of doctors and home remedies, pretty much everything except for medications, but it wasn’t until his mom took Murkoff’s Totally Legit Sleep Studies Quiz that Murkoff’s Totally Legit Sleep Studies for Kids Program was considered the best fit. They even gave us a scholarship once we enrolled him,” Stephenson explained.

Miles knew about the Murkoff’s Totally Legit Sleep Studies Quiz. Questions ranged from ‘What is your child’s dream occupation?’ to ‘Is your child a boring nerd or super cool and creative?’ and inquiries about lucid dreaming abilities. Applications required a drawing from each prospective child, and a month long dream journal either written by the child or dictated to someone else. 

“I drew me with an eye right here!” Chris exclaimed with a finger pressed to his forehead. “And the eye could shoot lasers and aminals and and…” 

Chris started giggling until more snot started running down his nose like a fountain of mucous. “And…the lasers could shoot people in their pee-pees and bottoms.”

“Chris,” Stephenson warned, trying not to smile. Chris let out a loud fart through his mouth and laughed. 

“That’s what got him the scholarship?” Miles asked. Stephenson nodded. 

That was something. Free money for drawing lasers shooting people in their junk in the front and their junk in the trunk. 

“Murkoff was only too happy to throw money at us. They felt that he was an ‘exceptionally gifted child that would benefit the program and future sleep studies.’ Still doesn’t make sense to me, but hey, everything seems to be working—Chris sleeps better, he’s making friends, I get free beer. I can’t complain.”

By this time, they had reached the party, held in the recreation room. There was laughter and smiles and happy, energetic kids, and equally happy adults. And more of those bomb-ass cupcakes. 

Only one person wasn’t smiling or looking particularly happy.


	8. Babies

VIII.

That someone stood to the left of the entryway, holding an infant that was only too happy to gum and drool and dig their deceptively sharp baby nails into the man’s face. The man tried his best to hold off the baby, but everyone knows you can’t win against those squishy, incontinent wrecking balls of destruction. They’re too valuable. And so gosh darned cute. 

Miles had to catch it on camera. He was the only one not having fun, unlike the baby.

“Looks like your kid is having a good time,” Miles observed.

“He’s not my kid,” said the unfortunate adult trying to politely bat away a tiny fist heading for one of his vulnerable corneas. “His mom had to run off for a minute.”

“So she chose you to be her son’s Jolly Jumper? Nice.”

“I would’ve preferred bodyguard; besides that, there’s Jolly Jumpers next door.”

A pair of arms passed in front of Miles’s viewfinder. 

“Aaaaanndreeeeew,” the owner of the arms cooed. “How’s my little bookie cookie dookie…” 

Apparently Andrew’s mom had a plethora of nicknames for him, as she went through letter after letter and then pairings of letters that rhymed with ‘ookie.’ Andrew didn’t seem to mind, however, given that his mom was holding him now. They went off to the aforementioned Jolly Jumper room where gaggles of babies were bouncing up and down in swings and enjoying themselves. The man who held Andrew last wiped off the spit with such venom you would’ve thought he had been licked by a creepy asshole with a tendency to gaslight and lick people’s ears or something. 

“You alright there?” Miles asked, not really caring if the man was alright or not. 

“Yeah, I’ll live,” the man replied. “What’s with the camera?”

“I’m a reporter,” Miles explained. “I report things. I was a correspondent for the Baby War back in 2012.”

“Woah,” the man exclaimed with genuine awe. “You were there for that?”

Miles nodded solemnly and brushed away a tear for his fallen comrades. You would think covering such a highly dangerous and traumatic event would’ve given Miles, or pretty much everyone else, pedophobia. “Not all babies,” Miles would’ve told you. 

Miles wanted to put it past him for the moment, so he introduced himself instead. The other man introduced himself as Waylon.

“Jennings?” Miles guessed.

“No.”

“Smithers?”

“No. It’s Park, Waylon Park.”

Miles blew air out the side of his mouth. “That’s a dumb name.”

“You’re a dumb name,” someone said. A woman came up to stand beside Waylon and slide a protective arm over his waist. 

“This is Lisa, my wife,” Waylon said.

“I make witty comebacks for a living,” she said with pride, jutting her chin out a little. 

“Dang!” It was Miles turn to be in awe. “Witty Comeback Makers make some beaucoup bucks. What’s your annual income?”

“Pfft, like a squibillion dollars. No, but for real, 900k to a million,” Lisa replied. 

Miles nodded and made a note on his notepad. Murkoff was known to accept applicants of all class divisions, hence all the scholarships, but the Park family likely didn’t need the assistance. 

“I’m Miles Upshur, freelance reporter, do you mind if I interview you guys?”

“Only if you admit to having an even dumber name than Waylon,” Lisa replied. Waylon narrowed his eyes a little. 

“Deal! My name is Miles Upshur, freelance reporter with a dumber name than Waylon, and I would like to interview you and your husband.”

Suddenly, Waylon got ambushed by an aminal. Wait. Animal, there we go.


	9. Aminals

IX. 

Waylon had been ambushed by a baby pig of all things, much to the delight of Chris.

“A pig! I finally got a pig! Little pig!” Chris screamed in crazy childish glee you either love or hate. “Mommy look, I got a pig finally!”

The Walker family had been standing near, and Miles could pick up an audible groan from Chris’s mom. “Just what we need, more aminals. Dammit, I mean animals.”

The pig scrambled into Chris’s waiting arms. “I’m gonna name you Chickenhead!” 

Everyone within earshot looked at Chris like he told a racist joke. Miles was so certain Chris would’ve been the kind of kid that named their pets after food items—like Porkchop or Bacon or Ham. 

“Right, so, about that interview?”


	10. Chapel

X. 

The addition of Chickenhead the Pig had increased the happy noise level in the recreation room, so Lisa and Waylon suggested visiting the chapel upstairs to conduct the interview and check on their kids at the same time. 

“Technically speaking, it isn’t a chapel anymore, but we still call it that. It’s still got the stained glass windows and every…”

There were no stained glass windows to speak of. Instead, every inch of the former chapel had been covered in blank walls, most of which were covered in paint or marker or crayon or chalk. In a normal world, parts of the walls and ceiling would be remained untouched by color, but in this world—in this room in particular—kids and adults were walking on the walls and ceiling in spite of the fact the Laws of Gravity were still in effect, and coloring every corner they could reach. 

“…Thing,” Waylon finished. 

“Don’t look so shocked,” Lisa assured him. “The elevator shaft has a blue Jell-o trampoline.”

Lisa made a loud whistle, which got most everyone’s attention. Miles noticed one of the kids was so in tune with his finger painting that he didn’t even look up. Or down, rather.

“Hey! Thing 1 and Thing 2! We’re doing an interview!” Lisa called up towards the ceiling. Two of the kids ran down the length of the left wall.

“I’m drawing a spirochete!” Thing 1 shouted.

“I’m drawing the purpose of meaning!” shouted Thing 2. 

Waylon looked up at the spot his sons were at. He nodded sagely and patted them on the head. “Nice work.”

“Really good,” Lisa agreed. “I’m digging the colors; I never would’ve thought the purpose of meaning would be so purple.”

“This is Mr. Upshur, a reporter,” Waylon said. “He’s here to interview us.”

Miles asked them several questions, mostly how they got their children into the program, if it worked for them. He also asked them about the personnel, how they seemed to be absent, and then there was all the strange, fun, and strangely fun goings-on—like, what was that all about, right?

“Now that you mention it,” Waylon began. He looked all around the room as if seeing it for the first time even though it wasn’t. “Strange things have been happening, fun things too, even strangely fun things.”

“And funny strange things,” Lisa chimed in. 

“It’s like this program is designed to take the dreams of children and turn them into reality for the express purpose of having a rocking good time, or something,” Waylon theorized. He rubbed his chin and narrowed his eyes like a nerd. 

“I should use my software programming powers to figure this out,” he theorized even more nerdily. Then he left. (Like a nerd.)

“I should follow after him and say witty things,” Lisa said. “Like, ‘Oh Waylon, you’re such a nerd!’ That should fetch me an extra 100 grand.” Then she left. (Not like a nerd.)

Thing 1 and Thing 2, hopefully not their real names, went back to drawing a spirochete and the purpose of meaning, respectively.

“I should tell you what’s really going on in an increasingly exasperating way that can be easily avoided if you’re immune to sedatives or can walk through walls or break windows,” a creepily calm voice said in his ear. Miles turned to see a kid looking not unlike Uncle Fester with a beatific look on his face, but maybe that was just his costume. It was the kid who was busy finger painting earlier. He was also standing perpendicular to Miles and was right at head level, and that was enough to kick the creep factor up to an 11 or 12. 

“Uh?” Miles asked.

“What?” the kid asked.

“Huh?”

“What?”

“Eh?”

“Erm?”

“What was that thing you said about being immune to sedatives?”

“Hi, I’m Marty!” The kid replied, ignoring Miles’s question. “And I know exactly what is going on.”

“You do?”

“…Sure!” Marty said while looking sideways, giving off the impression that he was a lying sack of garbage. In actuality, he was trying to show Miles his convenient plot device, which consisted of a messy painting of a something or other in a top hat. Below that was the caption: “IT’S IN THE LAB.”

“Hmmm,” Miles mused over. “Nope, sorry, still too abstract.”

Marty slapped a wet hand on Miles’s face before running back to his art project. “TAG!”

Miles wasn’t even mad, though he looked ridiculous with a green handprint on his face. “Nah, I’m good.”

There was no reason for him to engage in a game of Tag, anyway. A bell rung, perhaps the bell that once rang for worship, and everyone—adult and child, sans Miles—ran down the walls and out the door. One of the adults was nice enough to stop and tell Miles that it was time for the weekly discussion group.


End file.
